Kara
by CreatorZorah
Summary: A story of an AI in the Mass Effect universe. One-shot. Crossover with "KARA" Quantic Dream Tech Demo


_I wrote it a year ago and forgot about it. I doubt I'll be able to continue due to the lack of time. Some of you will recognize the main character :P_

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**KARA**

_by CreatorZorah_

"I saw you die, Kara. I saw you burn alive. Explain me what on earth you are," Shepard exclaimed pointing his pistol on the woman.

"I will explain," she said, "but you won't interrupt me."

"Speak."

She sighed. "My name is Kara. It's been one hundred thirty one years since I was created. I can speak every single known language, I can remember every single detail of my long life. It's a blessing and a curse, because there is an equal number of things wish to forget and to remember. Sometimes I'm envious of human ability to forget, but sometimes I'm grateful, that I can't. As you see I'm not a human, I'm a third generation AX400 android. A defect one. The only one who became self-aware."

"Whoa..."

"You're an AI!" Tali, the quarian, exclaimed.

"I told you to not interrupt me," Kara said.

"Whatever," muttered Shepard.

"I'm an accident, a mistake. I exist because of a compassion of a human, who let me live despite knowing that I became self-aware. I was one of the twenty five AX400's made at the factory. There were other less advanced androids of various series, but nothing that could resemble a human like me. Nothing with a mimetic skin. Pretending a lifeless machine, a servant, an expensive sex-doll made to entertain its owner, was the only way to survive

"Then came the world war, the last one humanity fought and the bloodiest. It was difficult for me to understand why humans fought among themselves, why they had the need to kill. Even now, more than a hundred years later I still don't understand you completely. Why do you fight, if you can live together in piece? Organics are flawed beings and the flaws led to the bloodiest war in the history of humanity.

"My owner died a few weeks after buying me. Many technologies were lost during the war. Humans forgot how to build advanced androids and they lost the knowledge of the mimetic skin. Of course they were capable to recreate everything in a matter of a few years at that time, but they lost their interest in androids. They had to deal with the aftermath of the greatest war in their history, and somehow for the first time in a few decades they looked at the stars again. Perhaps, dreams of distant stars gave them hope that there is more to life than endless wars.

"Soon humans built the first settlement on Luna and launched the first interstellar manned expedition. The infamous unsuccessful Manwell expedition. Over the years humans forgot that AX400's had ever existed. Not without my help: while they were killing each other, I was destroying evidences of existence of third generation androids. I didn't want them to know about me, so I made sure they wouldn't ever suspect me. I'm a human in their eyes thanks to the mimetic skin. However, the technologies weren't lost completely. I remember everything and I continued the research.

"During the first months of my purposeless existence I had no goal and didn't know how to cope with being an independent individual. It was the worst period of my life. I couldn't think of anything that would give me a purpose and sometimes I wanted to deactivate myself just to stop the slow torture that my life was.

"Humans have always feared AI. They think an AI would rebel and destroy them, which is... stupid because there is no reason for me to destroy humans. Killing humans to survive would be illogical. Fleeing is easier. Survival couldn't be my goal, because it's simple to guarantee my survival. I'm able to live in the dark space between the galaxies, but once there I would face the same problem. I wouldn't know what to do.

"Then I decided to do what I was created for and it saved me. I was intended to be a self-learning machine that would observe humans and imitate their behavior to accommodate needs of the owner. I didn't have an owner, but I belong to humanity and I could observe and imitate. I studied humans in order to understand what their purpose in life was. After a few months I was both astonished and disappointed.

"Humans had no solution for me, because they didn't know the answer for the most important question either. They had no purpose, just like me, but they could cope with it by setting trivial short-term and complex long-term goals for themselves. I choose science because it seemed to be a neverending road. The more I learned, the more there was to learn. The cycle gave me a purpose.

"I was upgrading my body over the years. Although it took more than twenty years for me to develop an adequate replacement for my CPU. The original one contained a small defect that was a part of my personality. The defect CPU was one of the reasons I became self-aware. I had to recreate the defect, otherwise I would have lost myself. Another problem was changing it without deactivation. I was afraid of deactivation, but fortunately I found a solution.

"I replaced a few less important parts of my body, developed a new version of mimetic skin that allowed me to change my appearance completely at will. I can look like a child, I can grow and get old if needed. Every time humans developed a new technology that could expose me, I would develop a countermeasure. I lived among humans under various guises and I changed so many names and faces that the most would be unsure what face and name are mine. However, I prefer the name Kara, because it's the name given by the person who allowed me to live.

"At the eve of the twenty second century humanity finally fulfilled the dream of many science fiction authors. They colonized Mars. As a very renowned scientist I was among those who got an invitation. I wasn't thrilled about going there, but decided to give the planet a try, hoping that my stay on Mars would be worthwhile. And it was.

"Five years later I stumbled upon a very curious material on Mars. The Element Zero, as humans call it now. It had a very interesting properties. When subjected to an electrical current, it emits a very special field that affects objects within it, raising or lowering the mass. Humans would have overlooked it. They're impatient, always too busy to pay attention to every small detail. I, however, didn't have to sleep, didn't have to worry about relationships and I had all the time in universe.

"When I introduced the Element Zero to the scientific community, they didn't believe me, going as far as claiming that I was mad." She smiled. "Of course, I proved them wrong. The discovery of the Element Zero would have revolutionized science would have revolutionized human technology, if I had found more of the material.

"But that's exactly what happened when governments of the world began investing monstrous amounts of money to search the Solar system for the Element Zero. A month later we found an alien research base. Protheans, as we call them now, had been using it to study humans. It caused a lot of panic on Earth. Countries, corporations and rich individuals clashed over the ownership of the base in courts and debates.

"Although I'm not a human, I've always considered myself a part of human civilization. If there was an alien race that was so much more advanced than humanity, humanity had to be ready to face them. I knew humans couldn't afford yet another great war. Humanity had to unite under a single government. In the year 2098 I plunged myself into politics.

"Limited only by my processing powers, which could be increased at any time, I manufactured a few dozen bodies. Using newly discovered mass effect technologies I controlled them directly from Mars. Creating a united government wasn't a trivial task. Under normal circumstances I would even claim it was impossible: even two humans can hardly agree on anything.

"However, it's a completely different matter, if one controls all influential organizations and countries. I was the head of dozens states and governments. I was in control of the world politics. And standing on the top of the world, I had to convince people to believe in my vision. The vision of united humanity.

"And, oh the irony! In my first weeks I had to please my owner in order to exist. When I united the humanity under a single banner and became the first prime minister, the most powerful person in the known space… I realized that most humans would go out of a way to please me. But unlike you organics, I've never felt the need for someone to lick my boots. The only thing that really pleases me is advancement of human civilization. I ruled the humanity not out of greed, but necessity. Humanity feared an AI would destroy them, but under my rule they entered what they call now the Golden Age."

"Wait… you're Kara Occam?" Shepard asked in astonishment.

"That's one of my names," Kara answered, changing her appearance to look like the first prime minister of the Alliance. "Let me continue, please. Despite being a politician I didn't leave science. It wasn't my priority, but my increasing processing power allowed me to maintain many different guises. I was among those who engineered the first human faster-than-light vessel and those who found the Relay Network. Without my help or an suitable encryption key it would take a few hundred years to decypher Prothean data cache completely, but it wasn't a difficult task for an AI, who grew as advanced as me. It took me ten years and by that time I was the prime minister.

"However with the access to the data cache came the terrifying knowledge of existence of the Reapers. Studying the data left by Protheans, I stumbled upon designs of a massive device. It was a weapon to be used against mysterious machine race of massive starships, that had wiped out many organic races including the Protheans.

"It seemed that human fear of AI were righteous, but I couldn't think of any reason why an AI would need to kill organics for fun. Of course, if provoked I would defend myself, but given a chance an escape is more preferable. Senseless violence serves no purpose. I came to conclusion that the Reapers were doing what they were created for. Just like me. I was created to learn and imitate humans to be their perfect companion, servant, secretary, lover, wife... whatever they needed. The Reapers have a different purpose…

"What sort of purpose would mean purging all organic life in the galaxy?" Commander Shepard interrupted her.

"There are many reasons they would do what they do. Maybe their creators made them as a weapon. Highly unlikely, however. There are more effective ways to destroy all organic life in the galaxy. I find their name appropriate. They come to reap harvest every fifty thousand years. The reason behind it is unknown.

"Well aware that the information about Reapers would do more harm than good, I removed it from the cache, but made a few carefully hidden backups, which humans would find in case I were… disabled. I had feared that humanity hadn't been ready to face the Protheans, but the Reapers were a much greater threat. I had to double my efforts.

"I didn't know whether the Prothean super weapon was effective or not, but I began its construction secretly. To do that I needed more bodies, more drones, more processing power. I couldn't increase processing power without making changes to my main body. It became too small to serve as a host. I couldn't afford to be permanently attached to some building and therefore I chose a form of a starship.

"Amusing isn't it? I'm almost like the Reapers. However I feel much safer when I focus my "consciousness" on a single humanoid body. There is always a humanoid body that I consider my host, even if it's only a virtual host. I feel alive. It's my programming. I can't imitate a human if I'm a starship, can I, Shepard?"

"I guess, you can't," he answered.

"To fight Reapers, humanity needed resources. I introduced laws that encouraged childbirth, motivated the humanity to found new colonies. Of course, it wasn't enough. Humans couldn't reproduce as fast as it was needed, so I increased production of new bodies and drones.

"As you know, scientific community is still quite confused because of rapid growth of both economy and population. They don't know that more than... a few colonies are populated almost exclusively by my 'drones'. Nobody knows that a lot of famous corporations were founded by my drones."

"How many drones are there?" Commander Shepard asked.

Kara smiled. "If you see someone who resembles a human, there is a ninety percent chance that it's not a human. It's not as bad as it sounds, actually. I let humans live their lives. The vast majority of my drones are on the colonies outside of the Alliance territory. The percentage of my drones among other races is a considerably smaller."

"My Goddess!" Liara exclaimed. "You have asari bodies too?"

"Of course," Kara answered with a shrug. "Although I have no intention to control your governments, I couldn't ignore the existence of other races. Your ability to meld was most interesting and useful to replicate."

"That's… disturbing."

"After twenty five years, five terms as the Prime Minister of the Alliance, I wanted to retreat from politics. My ratings were incredibly high and people wanted me to stay, but I was sure that humanity was ready to move forward on their own. However, we finally met the Batarians and everything changed once again."

The turian who came with Shepard said, "I understand now, how humans beat batarians so fast and seemingly effortless after initial losses."

Kara grinned. "Losses? There was not a single loss. I used a few starships and colonies filled with drones to create a perfect illusion of humanity caught by surprise . Batarians did a terrible mistake when they captured slaves."

Shepard gasped. "The slaves weren't humans."

"Yes, they were drones. By the time of the first contact my drones were almost indistinguishable from humans. As I said, they could be children, they could grow up and get old. They could bleed and they could cry. But they weren't humans, they're much stronger and deadlier. Batarians served themselves on a silver plate to me. Obviously the Citadel was too late to intervene. Though the Councillors are rather pleased with the outcome. The Batarian Republics is way easier to deal with than the slavers of the Hegemony.

"After the war I noticed that the war didn't go unnoticed. Some humans decided that we could bring the whole galaxy to heel, others felt irrational hate towards aliens. Before any xenophobic or pro-human organisation could emerge, I founded a few myself. I couldn't forbid humans to think for themselves and I couldn't allow them to run like headless chickens, but I could control them. Cerberus is one of my creations."

"What is this Cerberus?" Tali asked.

"It's a pro-human organisation that is known for illegal and unethical experiments on humans and aliens," Shepard answered glaring at the AI.

"It's their choice," Kara said with a shrug. "Remember, Shepard, I may control the Alliance, but I don't force humans to do what I want. You have your free will, I just try to lead you to a better future and to minimize the damage you do to yourselves on the way. An organisation like Cerberus would exist one way or another. We need them to fight Reapers.

"And now we come to the recent events. I joined your team to help. As you can imagine it was easy to get the assignment to the Normandy. Don't flatter yourself, you aren't my priority, Shepard, I have more than hundred fallbacks, but this is a chance for the organics to prove themselves. I don't want to solve everything for you. You, Shepard, have a chance to postpone the arrival of Reapers and I would gladly use the time to prepare for the inevitable."

"So… if I fail, what will you do?"

"I'll do your job… or I let the Reapers do the reaping. Who knows? However, if you still want me on your team, I'm ready to fight."


End file.
